Describing People
Elementary level
Description
Materials
Main Aims
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To provide clarification and practice of language used for describing people in the context of meeting tourists at the airport
Subsidiary Aims
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To provide accuracy and fluency speaking practice in a conversation in the context of describing other people's appearance
Procedure (40-47 minutes)
T shows SS a picture of a man and a woman talking on the phone. He asks them if these people are colleagues, and if so what kind of company they might work for. Then T asks where they are both at the moment. After that T asks students to try and describe the characters.
Now T says that the man's name is Brian and that SS's task is to listen to the dialogue and and answer two simple questions: 1. Where is Brian? and 2. What does the woman talk to him about? (or Why does he phone the woman? What does he want?) LISTENING SS check their ideas in pairs. WHF
On the screen, there are four people at the ARRIVAL GATE at the airport. Their names are written on the WB. After L2, SS are supposed to know how many people Brian is meeting at the airport, what their names are and which pictures (A, B, C or D) match each of the names. CCQs: How many people is Brian meeting? - We don't know. What are their names? - Here, on the board. Who is who in the picture? - We will listen and learn. LISTENING SS check their answers in pairs. WCF
T randomly writes the sentences describing people from the conversation on the WB (or sticks them on the wall if they have been printed out). T: Please, match the sentences to the people. (...) Now, please, in pairs make two or three sentences about Mr d'Collate. SS read their sentences and T writes them next to the picture in question (correcting them if it is necessary but without explanation, yet). T: Look at the sentences we have here. Can we divide them into two groups? (sentences, not you) All together, let's think. SS help teacher to divide sentences into two groups (He/She is... and He/She has...) T: Let me write them here. T fill in two tables in the right side of WB with the examples from L. He fills the table from the end of the sentence and while doing repeats them this the group to provide pronunciation drill. He also adds sentences about eyes (T: Usually, we don't only have hair but also eyes, a nose and something else). T writes (sticks) questions on WB and SS guess which answers they match. What does ... look like? How old is ...? How tall is ...? What colour hair/eyes does ... have? NB What does he look like? match all the answers in the table. Pronunciation drill for Qs and Answers.
1. T gives SS papers with photos of GOT characters (app. 20 sec per pic). SS in turns make sentences (She is.../He has...) in pairs without saying them loudly so as not to distract others. CCQs: Are we saying sentences loudly HO-HO, SHE HAS BLACK HAIR! - No, in pairs. Other SS shouldn't hear us. Are we discussing photos slowly? - No, quickly. Very quicky. 2. T says names of the characters. Pairs of SS say their sentences to the class.
SS are given sheets of paper with sentences and questions. All of them are INCORRECT. SS find and correct mistakes (2 minutes). In pairs, SS check their answers. In turns, 7 SS come up to the board and correct sentences.
SS are divided into new pairs. Now in turns, SS describe each other people in the class. The first person describes someone. They do NOT say the names of people described. The second person should guess who is being described. After that they change roles. In three minutes they should describe as many people as possible. CCQs: What should we tell our partner? - Hair colour, eye colour, age, how tall the person is, etc. T: How tall is Sevde? She's 1 metre 60. How tall is Arty? He's 1 metre 83. SS work in pairs. T monitors providing help if necessary. In the end, T quickly asks pairs how many people they could described.